Campus events honor King

Keynote speaker Malik Evans '02

conference on urban education, a musical performance, and a talk by Harvard historian Evelynn Hammonds are among the events planned at the University in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day on January 17.

The daylong conference "Critical Issues in Leadership: Urban Education" will address issues facing city school districts and highlight some existing programs that take on those challenges. In addition to honoring King, the event marks the launching of the College's "UR Here" initiative .

Cosponsored by Leadership Rochester, a nonprofit leadership development program, the conference opens with registration at 9:30 a.m. in the Bridge Lounge in Wilson Commons and concludes with a service at
5 p.m. in the Interfaith Chapel. Malik Evans '02, Rochester City School Board member,
is the keynote speaker at lunch and will discuss "Keeping the King Legacy Alive: Reaffirming our Commitment to Community."

Other sessions include a student-led discussion about minority stereotypes in popular culture and a closer look at successful education programs in Rochester run by
local college students.

At the Medical Center on Monday, Hammonds, a Harvard University historian known nationally for her analyses of race and gender in science and medicine, will discuss "The Physician's 'Negro': Comparative Racial Analysis in 19th-Century Medicine" at 1 p.m. in the Class of 1962 Auditorium (Room G-9425) in the Arthur Kornberg Medical Research Building.

Hammonds is the author of Childhood's Deadly Scourge: The Campaign to Control Diphtheria in New York City, 1880-1930 and coeditor of Gender and Scientific Authority. In her current work, Hammonds focuses on the intersection of scientific, medical, and sociopolitical concepts of race in the United States. She is completing two works, The Logic of Difference: A History of Race in Science and Medicine in the United States, 1850-1990 and the MIT Reader on Race and Gender in Science.

Hammonds's talk is sponsored by the Department of Community and Preventive Medicine, the School of Medicine and Dentistry Medical Education Office, the School of Nursing, the Department of History, the Frederick Douglass Institute for African and African-American Studies, the Program in Health and Society, and the College Diversity Roundtable, with additional support from the Office of Minority Student Affairs and the Charles Drew Pre-Health Professions Society. For more information, contact the Frederick Douglass Institute at x5-7235.

The Eastman School of Music has planned two special performances in honor of King, both of which are free and open to the public. On Monday, at noon in Kilbourn Hall, the school will present Let Freedom Ring, a work written by Eastman percussion student Colin Tribby. The performance, directed by Tribby, will feature a live reading by the Rev. Alvin Parris of portions of King's 1963 "I Have A Dream" speech. The reading will be accompanied by nearly 20 Eastman percussionists on the Kilbourn Hall stage. Other Eastman students--all of non-U.S. origin--will echo key lines in their native languages, from various positions in the hall.

On Friday, January 28, the Eastman Philharmonia, under the baton of conductor Neil Varon, will perform former Eastman faculty composer Joseph Schwantner's New Morning for the World--a work for orchestra and narrator, also based on the words of King. For this performance at 8 p.m. in Eastman Theatre, Paul Burgett '68E, '76E (PhD), University vice president and general secretary, will narrate.